A Broken Lock and a GPS Error: The Lucky Chain That Saved a Georgia Family

Casey Sparks pulled his truck to the curb outside a burning house in Lyerly, Georgia, on the night of October 17. He was not from the area. He was driving home to Concorde, Alabama, with his 13-year-old son, Cason. Their GPS had been rerouting them toward the Lyerly community for the last several miles, despite the fact that they had already passed through Chattanooga, Tennessee, on their way to a softball tournament in Dalton. Sparks, 37, told The Guardian that the device kept pointing them in that direction. He decided to follow it. When he saw flames engulfing a roof, he stopped the truck, told Cason to stay inside and call for help, and ran toward a side door.

That door was unlocked. Sparks later learned the lock had been broken and never repaired. He entered the home and found James Burke, 60s, asleep in a recliner in the living room. Burke, who had fallen asleep with his wife Larita and 12 children in their beds, woke to the sound of a stranger’s voice. Sparks told Burke, “Hey, you’ve got to get out of here. Your house is on fire.” Sparks then helped Burke move Larita and the children out of the building. He also guided firefighters to the scene, according to Burke’s account to WRCB television.

The evacuation was chaotic. Sparks encountered a teenage boy inside the home who had grabbed a hose pot in a panic. The boy told Sparks there were more people inside. Rather than wait for first responders, Sparks ran back into the smoke. He carried out the Burkes’ 10-year-old granddaughter, who is blind. He then escorted Larita and the remaining children to safety. Some of the children had disabilities or special needs, according to independent journalist Rick Karle, who first reported Sparks’s account. Sparks worked with another passerby who had stopped to help, allowing the man to stay with Cason outside while he went back in.

The fire consumed the three vehicles parked in the driveway and eventually caused the structure to collapse. No one in the house was physically hurt. Larita Burke told WRCB that if the evacuation had been delayed by five minutes, the outcome would have been different. “We wouldn’t have made it,” she said. The cause of the fire was not immediately determined.

James and Larita Burke have fostered more than 500 children over the last 15 years. As of Monday, an online fundraiser organized by James’s sister, Renia Evans, had raised more than $11,000 to help the family find a rental home large enough for all 14 of them. Evans said in a statement that the family would “forever be grateful for Casey” and that his courage would not be forgotten. Sparks said he believes divine intervention placed him at the right place at the right time. “It was God. That’s it,” he said. He and Cason drove back to Alabama in near silence after the firefighters put out the blaze. Cason told his father, “Daddy, I wasn’t ready for that.” Sparks replied, “Me neither.”

The family is currently staying with community members who rallied to support them. James Burke told WRCB that while they are traumatized by the loss of their belongings, they plan to move forward. “All of our babies made it out,” Burke said.